Tuesday, February 28, 2012

NATIVE FISH SOCIETY IS THE WAY FORWARD FOR NATIVE WILD SALMONIDS

The Native Fish Society has an important mission that others
believe in and support. We are making progress.
I have worked in native fish conservation for more than 40 years and
have spent time with legislators in my constant effort to strengthen and fund
conservation. Senator Jan Wyers
responded in the 1980s by funding five native fish conservation positions at
ODFW. It was though that program that
key people were hired and important work for Oregon’s wild salmonids was
accomplished. In 2012 the legislature is
again concerned about the future of wild salmonids as more and more populations
are protected under the ESA and others
are lost forever. The NFS Hatchery
Accountability Project clearly states that there needs to be better accountability
for biological and cost impacts of hatchery programs. There have been two
hearings this session and in the next session our goal is to hold the agency
accountable.

At one time it was possible to expect administrative
solutions to problems affecting native fish management by government agencies, but that has
changed, so legal action is necessary to force the government to follow its own
rules and comply with state and federal law.
This is why we have put ODFW on notice to clean-up its Sandy Hatchery
program so that wild winter steelhead, coho, fall chinook and spring chinook
are protected and a path is opened up for their recovery under the ESA. A 76%
stray rate of hatchery spring chinook into the wild chinook spawning grounds is
not acceptable under state or federal rules and it needs to be corrected.

We are in Stevenson Washington
tonight defending the management program for recovery of wild summer steelhead
in Wind River.
This run has been protected as a wild steelhead management river since 1982,
but there is local pressure for a stock and kill fishery. We are involved in these public meetings to
make sure that the Wind River wild summer
steelhead continue to rebuild and eventually recover.

The NFS is working for wild salmon, steelhead and trout
throughout the Northwest through direct action and by supporting the good work
of other groups. Our volunteer river
stewards are working in their communities for healthy watersheds and native
fish. It is a big job and for a small
organization and it can seem wild and wooly, but we are undaunted in our
efforts and we have a record of success when we take time to look in the
rear-view mirror.

I am committed to the future of the Native Fish Society
because it is an effective advocate for native wild fish in the Northwest. We base our advocacy on the best available
science and there is a lot of it being published that has direct bearing on our
conservation work. We have a history of
success but we could do better with more funding and more folks to push our
advocacy program forward. The point is
that as we grow our funding base we do so without sacrificing our mission for
native wild fish. The organization and its leadership have made
that commitment and with the support of our members and friends we can be
successful in solving complex and difficult problems for wild native fish in
the region.